Carnage Boxset

by Jones, Lesley

  “He isn’t perfect. He leaves wet towels on the bed and whiskers in the sink, and he doesn’t always flush.”

  “Are you being serious right now? He doesn’t flush in case it wakes you up, and you are the messiest person I know, so don’t even go there with wet towels on the bed. You’re a total slob when you wanna be and then completely anal about everything being spotless when you don’t … especially when your mother’s coming over.”

  “I love that you still know me so well.”

  “Always, G. Always.”

  “You’re gonna go, I can feel it.”

  “I can’t help it, babe, I have to. I just want . . . just try to have a good day today. Let go of the guilt. Do your Christmas thing, but let your people love you. Your kid's worry. Your husband worries, and the Looney Tunes you call family worry.”

  “I’ll try.”

  “Promise?”

  “I promise.”

  “Good girl. I love you, Georgia Rae.”

  “I love you, too. Kiss Beau and baby M for me, and tell them I love them.”

  “They know, G. They know.”

  * * *

  I sit up straight, my eyes wide as they attempt to take in my surroundings. The room’s dark, but I can hear at least one bird singing outside.

  Cam still sleeps soundly beside me, but it’s Sean’s lips that I can feel on mine. I brush my fingers over them and breathe in deeply.

  I both love and hate moments like this. They make me feel completely torn.

  I stare down at my husband. His arms are stretched out above his head, disappearing under the pillow that his head rests on.

  At my request, he’s been growing his hair since last summer. He’s had it trimmed a couple of times, but at the moment, it’s the perfect length. It curls where it reaches his collar, and the front is long. Though he usually pushes it back, right now it’s partly hanging in his face. I want to reach out and run my fingers through it and then rake my nails over the beard covering his cheeks and chin. It’s a gorgeous silver-grey and has become one of my favourite things about him.

  One of an endless list.

  He’s my rock. My world. He makes me who I am, a much better person than I could have ever hoped to be, and yet, here I am, watching him sleep after waking from a dream about the other love of my life.

  Sean McCarthy.

  He doesn’t come to me often these days. But when he does, I know.

  I can feel him, smell him.

  On me.

  I slide out of bed and head for the bathroom. I do what I need to do, wash my hands, and lift my hoodie from the hook where I left it last night as I slide my feet into my UGGs and head out onto the landing.

  Our bedroom is at the very back of our house, and the kids’ rooms are all towards the front. Kiks is the only one with her door open, so I take a peek inside to check on her. She’s our sensitive child and has recurring nightmares. They started when we explained to the kids about my past, about Sean, Baby M, and Beau. She knows about Tamara, how she died, and that Cam was shot . . . and she worries about all of it.

  I feel guilty about this. The fact that my past has impacted on my daughter’s peace of mind. Given a choice, I would’ve protected all of my kids and only told them what I felt was necessary, but there’s something out there called the internet, and we thought that it was best we told them the truth and answered their questions ourselves.

  Becks lifts his head from where he’s curled at the bottom of Kiki’s bed and looks towards me, his tail wagging while the rest of him remains still.

  My daughter’s dark hair is spread out around her as she lies with her face buried in the pillow. A black T-shirt covers her skinny frame, and I watch her shoulders move up and down as she breathes.

  Kiks, Lu, and George will all be turning fifteen after Christmas, and our house is a hive of teenage hormonal tension. Kiks probably causes the least drama, unless of course, Lu chooses to pick a fight with her.

  I head down to the kitchen and make myself a coffee. Our other dog, Rooney, isn’t in his bed either, and I assume he’s with one of the other kids. George probably, since Lu and Harry both complain when the dogs lie on their beds, which, considering I have a no dogs upstairs rule, should never actually happen. But I’m only their mum, no one ever bloody listens to me.

  The whole world thinks I’m some kind of superwoman who’s battled on through tragedy to build an empire and become a world-renowned philanthropist. My kids and my dogs, though, couldn’t give a monkey’s about any of that and have very selective hearing when it comes to listening to anything I say.

  I sometimes wonder if they would listen if I stamped my feet and shouted, “Do you know who I am?” Probably not. They’d all be wearing their noise-reducing headphones and not hear a word.

  Or, they’d just blatantly ignore me.

  I smile to myself as I head to the mudroom, pull on Cam’s quilted Barbour jacket, and grab a blanket from the basket I keep by the back door. If only they knew about the things I used to get up to. I used to live such a rock-star life. I could never confess to my kids some of the things I’ve done over the years. Some of them when I wasn’t much older than they are now. Lu would disown me, Kiks would pass out in shock, George would just go into denial and Harry? Well, I might just get a fist bump from him. He usually has my back.

  I collect my coffee from the kitchen and head out to the back patio. I sit in one of the swinging two-seaters and cover myself with the blanket. It’s absolutely bloody freezing, but no matter what the weather’s like, this is my favourite spot to come and think out my thoughts.

  Today is the first of December. Seventeen years ago on this very day, I lost the then love of my life in the most horrific of circumstances.

  I lost my son. My sweet innocent baby boy, who never got to take a single breath.

  I almost lost my own life, and for a long time after the accident, I wished that I’d been killed too.

  This year though, I feel a little different about the anniversary of Sean and Beau’s deaths. It still hurts. It’ll always hurt. Not just today, but every day. I will forever feel that short, sharp stab to my heart the moment thoughts of them hit my conscience, that will never change, and I don’t want it to.

  But after so long, I feel like I’ve finally accepted that I can’t change what happened on that cold icy day so many years ago. I’m not sure if I’ve just accepted it or if I’ve gotten over the guilt of being the only survivor. The guilt of being able to move on, once again find love and have four beautiful children.

  Do you ever get over something like?

  They say that grieving is a process, and by ‘they’, I mean just about everyone I came into contact with when I first lost Sean. It got to the point where I not only wanted to end my own life, but that of every person who felt the need to talk me through the stages.

  Denial.

  Anger.

  Bargaining.

  Depression.

  Acceptance.

  I’m not sure that there’s a hard and fast rule about the order in which you’re supposed to experience each of these, but I feel like finally, I’ve reached the last one.

  So yeah, today is a different first of December than the previous seventeen. I won’t be curling up in a ball and hiding away from the rest of the world wishing things were different. I won’t be running around our house, maniacally hanging Christmas decorations on anything that stands still long enough, in an attempt to ignore the guilt I feel for moving on.

  Today, I’m gonna be a functioning mother to my kids and a put together wife for my husband. . . that’s the plan anyway.

  I pull my feet underneath me in the big chair and lean across the arm to push the button on the patio heater. It lights instantly, casting a glow all around me and competing with the sky, which is starting to change colour. There is a blackbird singing in the distance, and if I listen hard enough, I can hear the horses in the stables.

  The couple buying Lu’s horse are coming tom
orrow. They have a ten-year-old daughter and want to get her a horse for Christmas. Lu isn’t interested anymore. She whines and complains constantly about the early mornings and rarely rides these days.

  She doesn’t have a boyfriend yet, but I know it’s gonna happen soon. I close my eyes and smile when I think back to being her age. I’d been obsessively in love with Sean McCarthy for four years when I was fifteen.

  My stomach flip-flops around inside me as I think about the fact that I was exactly the age the girls are now when I lost my virginity to him.

  He was my life.

  The other half of me.

  A loud sob takes me by surprise as it escapes my chest, travels up my throat, and forces its way out into the cold, early morning chill.

  So much for this year being different.

  “I’ll let you off that one, G. Now get your shit together. You’ve got this.” I hear Sean’s voice in response.

  I wonder why this happens? Why I sometimes hear him, dream about him? Maybe I’m a little bit insane, perhaps I’m totally mad, and no ones noticed it yet. Perhaps they have, and I’m just such a nut job that I’m delusional.

  I mean, what sane person sits outside at seven in the morning when it’s below zero and has a conversation with herself and her dead husband?

  The timber door opens, and I jump.

  “Fuck me!’ Tallulah gasps, her hand goes to her chest, and she stills.

  “Lula!”

  “What? You scared the shi . . . z outta me. What you . . .” She trails off and studies me for a few seconds. “You all right?”

  My daughter isn’t stupid, neither of them are. Lu might not be as sensitive as Kiks, but she’s highly perceptive, and just like her dad, she can read people like a book.

  She’s also probably aware of the date.

  “I’m fine,” I lie.

  “Should I get Dad?”

  “No, let him sleep. I’m okay, I promise.”

  She tilts her head to the side and chews on her bottom lip.

  “One day, will you tell me about him?”

  Air whooshes from my lungs and exits my nose with a puff of condensation, making it visible.

  “Sean?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What would you like to know?”

  “What it was like being married to someone so famous, being so young, and ya know . . . everything that happened.”

  I swallow.

  “What do you know already?”

  Her eyes dart away from mine, a move that I make when I’m either caught in a lie or about to tell one.

  “I’m sure you’ve already read plenty online.”

  “Yeah, but half of that probably ain’t even true, I’d rather hear it from you.”

  “Isn’t true.” I correct her.

  Fuck me, I’ve turned into my mother.

  “What ain’t?”

  I shake my head and let out a sigh. My kids speak far more proper than I ever did, but the occasional “ain’t” slips in there every now and then. And where Lula is concerned, the F-bomb, too.

  “I was pointing out that the correct word you were looking for is ‘isn’t’ not ‘ain’t’.”

  “Oh, don’t start.”

  I fight my smile while wondering how many times I’ve had this conversation with my own mother as I watch Tallulah roll her eyes.

  Not wanting to argue with my daughter or get into a conversation about my past, I go for diplomacy and a subject change.

  “Where’s Kiki?”

  “She’s up, and nice divert by the way.”

  Despite the cold, I feel my cheeks heat. I’ve been busted by my own fifteen-year-old daughter.

  “I’m not diverting, we’ll talk, but today isn’t the day.”

  She studies me for a long moment. Her blue eyes, which are so much like mine, roam my face.

  “I’m sorry, Mum. For what happened to you.”

  My lips tremble, and my chest judders as I fight not to cry. It isn’t just the date and the topic of conversation, it’s the fact that I’m having it with my daughter, the one that Cam usually has to step in and stop me from throttling.

  A tear slips from my eye, and Tallulah steps towards me.

  “Sorry. I should’ve picked a better day to bring this up.”

  She hits me with force as she lands in my lap.

  I’m shocked at her show of emotion and wrap my arms around her skinny frame. The door to the back deck slides open, and Kiks steps out while staring down at her phone. She takes a step back when she sees us, and like her sister, her hand flies to her chest.

  “Bloody hell, you made me jump. I was just texting you—” Her eyes dart between us. “What’s happened? What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing,” Lu and I say in unison. Kiki’s dark eyes, which are so much like her dad’s, continue their dance between our faces.

  “Just giving Mumma a cuddle,” Lu explains.

  “Why, Wha’dya do?”

  I smile at that. Lu is the one out of our four that’s usually in trouble, so Kiki is right to suspect.

  Tallulah lets out a huff. “It’s December first, I’ve not done anything wrong. I just thought Mum could do with a cuddle.”

  Kiks licks her lips and nods slowly. “You doing okay, Mum?”

  “Doing better now that I’ve had a cuddle.”

  Kiki throws herself down beside Lu and me, wrapping her arms around both of us, and sounds breathless as she says with her lips pressed against my cheek, “Sorry today is a sad day for you. I hate this day every year and just wish I could make it better.”

  I smile.

  And I cry.

  “You do make it better, Kiks. You, Lu, George, Harry, and Dad. You all make it better. Not just this day, but every day of my life.”

  Neither of my girl's replies. We just hold on to each other while the birds sing their dawn chorus and we gently swing back and forth in the cold, early morning air. I take a moment to appreciate how lucky I’ve been in my life to be loved the way that I am.

  I hear the door slide open again.

  “What the . . . what the fuck are you doing? What’s wrong?” Cam’s voice booms across the decking.

  “Just giving Mumma some love on her sad day,” Kiks states, her mouth still pressing against my cheek.

  “George?”

  He’s worried. I know him well enough to be able to hear it in his voice.

  I wipe my face on Kiki’s shoulder and look over it at my husband.

  “You all right, babe?”

  “I’m all right. The girls were just looking after me.”

  I kiss both of my daughters on the tops of their heads. “You best get over to the stables, else you’ll be late for school.”

  They each kiss me on a cheek, stand, kiss their dad good morning, and then walk side by side across the grounds of our home towards the stables.

  I watch them for a few seconds. The emotions caused by that little moment we just shared threatening to burst out of me in the form of heaving sobs and tears.

  I turn my face towards Cam, my eyes meeting his as he studies me warily. Eyebrows drawn down, his lips pressed together, forming a plump pink line amongst the salt-and-pepper whiskers of his beard.

  My husband is so fucking hot.

  “Kitten?” he questions again. Despite him having to witness me falling apart in some way or another on this date for so many years, I can still hear the concern in his voice.

  “I love you.” I know he knows this, but I want and need for him to hear me say it.

  “I know. I love the fuck out of you, too.” His wet tongue slips out of his mouth and slides back and forth across his bottom lip.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing. Come over here.”

  His hands go to his hips, settling just over the waistband of a pair of jogging bottoms. His broad top half is covered by a grey hoodie. He again studies me for a long moment, but when I give him my best sad-eyed, pleading look, he relents and cautiously moves toward
s me.

  My big, confident, handsome Tiger is always unsure of what mental state I’m going to be in on these kinds of days. Usually, he stands back, observes, and works out on instinct what I need from him.

  Cam sits down heavily in the chair beside me, causing it to swing back and forth. Sliding his arm around my shoulders, he pulls me into him and kisses the top of my head. I slide my own arm across his flat belly and pull myself closer. He then covers us both with the blanket I have on my lap.

  “What’s going on?” he eventually asks.

  “Nothing much. I came out here to drink my coffee, the girls came out and caught me having a moment, and then the three of us shared another moment. Then you came out, making my morning perfect.”

  “Babe, it’s fucking freezing. If you come back inside, I’ll make you nice and warm and show you what a perfect morning’s really all about.”

  I rest my cheek against his hard pec and my hand against his hard dick.

  “The kids have to get to school. Are the boys up?”

  “Don’t know. But if you don’t take your hand off my morning wood, my dick will be up, and I’ll be taking you back to bed and calling them a taxi.”

  I slide my hand back up to his belly, this time under his hoodie so I can rest it against his hot skin, saying, “Ya know what would make my day better?”

  “Sitting on my face?”

  I nudge him with my shoulder as I shake my head.

  “The trees are getting delivered today, and Squires are coming to do the outside lights. Can we keep the kids home and just have a family day?”

  He leans away so that he can look down at me. “That’s how you wanna spend today?”

  Surprise evident in his voice. He’s lived with my usual manic routine on this anniversary for too long not to be shocked that I want to spend it differently this year.

  I’ve been selfish. I know I’ve been selfish, but in all honesty, it’s the one day of the year that I’ve always let my grief entirely consume me. If I don’t take this day, I don’t know that I’ll get through the rest of them.

  To the rest of the world, it might look like I have this amazing, beautiful life, but I still feel the hurt caused by the events that happened to me seventeen years ago. I have scars, both physical and mental. I don’t see a counsellor anymore, and I’m not on any kind of medication, but that doesn’t mean I’m not still hurting. I just choose to take one day a year to grieve. When the painful memories threaten to consume me, I count the days until the first of December, when I know I can let that happen.